The present invention relates to a color image recording apparatus for recording image data which have been supplied from an external source in a selectable range of color quality values on print media.
Color image recording apparatus record color images in response to color commands applied by an external source such as a host computer. The color commands are included in image data supplied from the host computer.
The conventional color image recording apparatuses are capable, as hardware, of recording images in complex color patterns such as gradation patterns including continuous ranges of lightness, hues, and saturations, as well as in simple colors. If image data indicating a gradation are supplied from the host computer to the color image recording apparatus, then the color image recording apparatus can record an image having the gradation represented by the image data.
Most image recording software presently available in the market does not take into account the reproduction of such gradations. Existing image recording software cannot be relied upon in recording gradation images on the color image recording apparatus.
Therefore, the ability of the color image recording apparatus to record images in gradation patterns has not been fully put to use.
It may be possible to record images in gradation patterns on the color image recording apparatus by including gradation image data in the software which instructs the host computer. In order to include gradation image data in the software, an image to be recorded in a gradation pattern must be divided into small regions, and colors must be specified for the respective regions. Such a process is not practical as it would be tedious and time-consuming, require a large memory capacity, and places a larger burden on the host computer software.
There is also known a color image recording apparatus which automatically adds a color to a background, by designating such a background color, when image data containing no command for recording any color in the background are supplied to the color image recording apparatus.
If a dark tone is designated as a background color, then a recorded foreground image looks lighter and stands out in sharp relief against the background.
Heretofore, only a single background color tone can be designated. A background color recorded in a single tone makes the image look plane.